Nuclear Medicine without Nuclear Reactors or Uranium Enrichment
Derek Updegraff and Seth A. Hoedl, Ph.D.
Center for Science, Technology, and Security Policy
American Association for the Advancement of Science
June 13, 2013, rev.
Summary
All commonly used medical radioisotopes can be produced without using nuclear
reactors or enriching uranium, or can be replaced with other isotopes that
can be produced without a fission reaction, or by alternative technologies.
Reactors not using natural uranium fuel require uranium enrichment, therefore
justifying enrichment facilities that can be used for the production of
weapons-usable highly enriched uranium (HEU). All reactors also produce
weapons-usable plutonium as a byproduct of normal operation, although
those using natural uranium fuel produce the most.
These reactors and enrichment facilities are not necessary for medical
isotope production.
Particle accelerators currently produce many medical isotopes. This report
shows that all commonly used medical isotopes currently produced in reactors
can be produced in accelerators, or replaced with accelerator-produced
isotopes or alternative technologies. None of the accelerator options
discussed herein would involve significant proliferation risk.
The extensive literature on production alternatives for the world’s most
widely used medical isotope, technetium-99m, makes possible an analysis of
the cost and security aspects of these alternatives. While there is a good
deal of uncertainty associated with cost data, since commercial accelerator
production of Mo-99/Tc-99m has not yet commenced, the data suggest that
accelerator production has the potential to be cheaper than reactor
production, and at the very least will not prove prohibitively expensive.
For commonly used isotopes other than technetium-99m, a detailed cost
estimate for accelerator production is beyond the scope of this paper.
Nevertheless, it is clear that such alternatives are feasible. It seems
unlikely that in the aggregate these alternatives would be prohibitively
expensive. More R&D would support a full transition to commercial supply
of isotopes other than Tc-99m using accelerator-based processes. Targeted
investments in R&D for commercial production of the other isotopes,
through contracts by NIH or DOE, could have substantial impact on the
commercial availability of accelerator-produced medical isotopes, both
in the US and abroad.